Email Personalization – Let the Data Do the Work

The more you know about someone, the easier it is to talk to them. As you get to know someone’s likes and dislikes, habits and preferences, needs and wants, you can begin to provide them with answers, suggestions and solutions that are a best fit for them. This is modern email personalization in a nutshell!

Where the goal was once to create a deal or an offer so good it prompted people to buy, today’s email personalization is more about understanding people, to bring them what they want and need, versus just something that’s appealing. The way to do this is with data. By speaking directly to someone in a specific sense, you’re able to make a connection that more often than not results in a positive reaction—be it a click, sale or something else.

Thankfully, in a time where understanding people is more important than ever, data prevalence is also at an all-time high.

Cultivating and leveraging data through your ecommerce email marketing is paramount. The more data you have, the more complete the picture of your customer.

Are they male or female? How old? What’s their annual income? These are all important questions to consider in marketing, but even these are not specific enough on their own to help you create effective email campaigns. You need to dig deeper, and to do so you need the leverage that your ecommerce platform provides. Things like:

How frequently a customer makes a purchase on your website;

What the average dollar amount they spend per purchase is;

What types of products they most often buy;

How often they use a coupon or shop a promo.

Pairing demographic traits with shopping histories paints a more complete picture of your customer than either side alone can. And, ecommerce websites that put two and two together will find that their email marketing benefits tremendously.

Talk to your customers

When you know that Jane Doe is a woman in her 20’s who shops on your website for cosmetics about twice a month, with an average checkout order of $50, you have a substantial amount of information when it comes to speaking to her. Matching up Jane’s traits with your email capabilities opens the door to effective email marketing. You could:

Check and see what product(s) Jane is due to purchase based on her ordering habits and send an email advertising one or more of these products with a discount code.

Email her about a brand new product on your site that’s popular with shoppers like Jane, prompting her to try it.

Notify her of a flash sale specific to products that she frequently buys or has saved on her wish list.

All of the above are going to yield a much better result than simply blasting out an offer to Jane Doe and a thousand other customers, who may or may not have any trends or traits in common.

Set up personalized triggers

Finally, it’s critical to use customer data to your advantage when setting up triggers. Automating your ecommerce marketing email in a personalized way is invaluable and can save you time while generating revenue. If Jane Doe performs X action and Y email is sent as a result, you’re maintaining personalized communication that offers value, even if that value isn’t a direct conversion.

Data drives success

There’s no substitute for personalized customer data in ecommerce email marketing, and how you leverage that data has a profound effect on how your bottom line is impacted. The narrower the focus, the higher the potential for conversions, and the more value your emails have to the people receiving them. Start a conversation that your customers want to have!